Speak Truth to Power

I
Have a Fantasy…a somewhat dark
fantasy that sometimes creeps into my dreams. In the dream version I’m living a
quiet conscious life – minding my own business and living as creatively and ethically I can, and not imposing my
wishes on anyone else. Though it seems I had forgotten to pay a parking ticket.

So, in that dark
dream, a gang of costumed thugs, bearing all manner of weaponry (and badges),
shows up, abuses me with painful violence, and hauls me off and puts me in a
cage. Some hours after this kidnapping, I am manacled and brought before a man
in a black robe who is seated on an elevated platform that resembles a throne.
A plaque on his podium announces that he is the “Honorable Judge James Jones”.

Now in the real
world if this happened I would never get to say what I’d really like to say. If
I attempted to do so, I’d undoubtedly be interrupted, accused of “contempt of
court”, and thrown back in a cage as punishment. So instead of speaking freely,
I’d attempt to mitigate my situation by asking questions – along the lines of
those suggested by Marc Stevens in his wonderful little book, “Adventures In Legal Land”.

But in the world of
a lucid dream, a fantasy world, I’d ultimately speak freely – stating exactly
how I perceive my situation and judging the invalidity of the ethic that put
the black-robed slave on his elevated bench. Since I’ll never get to speak
truth to such a man of power, I’m setting down in thisfantasy what I would
really like to say.

Facing
the Judge“Judge Jones”, I
start off politely, “I am trained both as a scientist and as a psychotherapist
– and 42 years ago I began looking for the answer to the BIG QUESTION: ‘What
has to happen for our species to thrive and flourish?’” I have spent a lifetime
inquiring into the basis of perceived reality in the 3 dimensional world – and also
in the world where no one likes to go: the inner working of the human
mind. I started questioning

“Thirteen years
later”, I’d continue, “I realized that the answer is simple. For humanity to
thrive, it is only necessary that our institutions make ethical decisions that
lead to ethical actions. A validly ethical act is always one that that
increases someone’s creativity, awareness, truth (in the scientific sense of
the word)”, love, or personal evolution.

Hearing the word
“ethical”, the man in black starts looking nervous. He appears to have no idea
what I’m talking about. He probably thinks ethics are just a set of rules to
which he is required to give lip-service, and that the subject of ethics is
trivial – and 43 years ago I’d have agreed with him, because I still believed
that government existed to protect human rights – as stated in the Declaration
of Independence. I was wrong – and so is he. That is not the purpose of
government. It should be. We’d like it to be. But it’s not. Governments are
power brokerage cartels – and their purposes are totally self-serving. So I continue explaining.

“Mr. Jones, the exercise of power over others (the
initiation of force and/or the threat of physical violence),
is only ethical in the defense of self or others – and nowhere else.” This
fundamental principle is a purely logical consequence of the definition of a valid
ethic. And furthermore, as I learned in
my 25 years as a therapist in private practice, only two groups of people seek
power over others: Psychopaths and Slaves. Follow my reasoning, and you’ll
understand how this works.”

“Since I don’t know
yet which you are, Mr. Jones, I’ll give you first the feedback from which a
slave might benefit – because I know that psychopaths are immune to corrective
feedback.”

Your
Story, Judge
“At this point, James, you now have the essential
elements of my story – so I’ll tell
you the core elements of yours.”

Notice that at this
juncture I’ve dropped the honorific “Mr.” and I’m addressing him as an equal.

“You are a slave, James.
In ceding your freedom for the privileges of a slave, you’ve effectively sold
your soul – by becoming part of a power brokerage cartel. You are, to
all intents and purposes, a minor component in a machine called ‘government’ – a machine that exists only to benefit
the political class that you answer
to, and a still higher class, the nobility
that owns the machine – the ownership
class. I doubt you understand this message – so I’ll explain.”

At
this point the man in black interrupts saying, “Stop right there! If I wanted
your opinion, I’d be giving it to you. Continue in this frivolous vein and I’ll
hold you in contempt!”

“Ho ho”, I reply,
“that ploy would work in other circumstance – but this is my dream fantasy, and I’ll say whatever I damn please. Besides,
James, what I’m saying isn’t just ‘opinion’, but rather a few demonstrably
provable facts.”

In
Case You Weren’t Aware…“James, when a
child can’t get real love, he’ll settle for approval.
Since the age of about two, your life has been driven by the need for approval and the concomitant need to avoid disapproval. These needs
define the core culture of bureaucracy – in which the avoidance of disapproval
is the primary motivator. In this culture, the destruction, elimination, and
avoidance of corrective feedback are paramount.”

“Moreover, James,
you’ve always resented being a slave, so you get even by treating those with
less power the way you have been treated – by the exercise of frivolous and unethical power over them. Unfortunately, this revenge
doesn’t hurt the people above you in your hierarchy. Instead it helps them, and hurts everyone else
around you. In effect, you’ve become the thing you fear and hate the most.”

“Bailiff!”
yells the judge, “I won’t hear any more of this. Off with his head!”he
screams, echoing the words of the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland. But
like the Red Queen, his authority is an illusion that can be swept away when
its unreality is revealed.

“Yes, James, you
have much power over others. Even now, if this weren’t my lucid dream, you could push a button and a small army of heavily
armed (lesser) slaves would rush into the room and remove me to a cage – at
your command. But just because you have
the power to do such things, doesn’t mean you have the right to exercise that power.

The gun-toting slaves that you command
are even more enslaved than you, but they too have made a bargain with the
upper classes. Like you, they are paid to do the things they do – and they’d
rather comply with evil than give up the paycheck that feeds their families.
Like you, they think that as slaves they are not responsible for their actions – but in fact we are all responsible
for what we do, whether ordered to or not.”

“I
wouldn’t do that”, says the black-robed figure, “I’m one of the ‘good guys’”.

“I beg to differ
with you, James. You are not a ‘good guy’, because you have chosen to represent
a gang of cutthroat parasites whose sole purpose in creating your machine was
to transfer wealth from those who’ve created it to a group that creates nothing
– and like most parasites you are destroying your host.”

Where
Did You Get Your “Authority”?“Coming back to your
story, James, where do you think you got the so-called “authority” that you
wield with such dispatch? Originally your parents were that authority. You grew
up in a household that required you to give up your innate freedom in order to
maintain some level of closeness with your parents. It was a bad bargain, and
one that you might have grown out of with some help. But, given your dependent
circumstances at the time, it was inevitable.”

“In school you were
a ‘good boy’ and transferred your slave mentality to your teachers, whom you
were told you had to obey. And still later you transferred it to your
employers, who, in your case, are members of the political class.”

“I
just do as I’m told”, the man demurs.

“As do all slaves”,
I reply, “just like the slaves that ran the death camps under Hitler.”

About
Power Brokerage…“Now comes the
tricky part, James. The members of the political class cannot delegate to you,
or to anyone, authority that they do not possess themselves as individuals. And as individuals, the
members of the political class have no more authority over others than you did
when you were born – which is to say NONE.”

“How
dare you say such a thing?” protests the bureaucrat. “My authority was vested
in me by the State”.

“So where did all
the authority come from that you believe has been delegated to you? The fact
is, James, there is no such authority – nor is there a ‘State’. The political
class and its owners in the ownership class
made up these concepts thousands of years ago. They are illusions – shared
hallucinations that you have been conditioned
in your childhood to accept as reality. Such conditioning is the primary purpose of 'public education'”

“The value of this
fictional authority to the ownership class lies in the fact that they’ve
convinced the general public that the authority is real – and that they are
therefore able to exchange portions of said authority for services – like ‘law
enforcement’, ‘courts’, ‘tax collections’, ‘political concessions’, ‘assassinations’,
‘wars’, and so forth. This kind of transaction is the very hallmark of a cartel
– as is the hierarchic pecking-order.

This military command style of management can be seen as prevalent even
among most civilian groups today – and it is a near perfect model as a slave
control mechanism. Seen factually, James, your authority is nothing but an
opinion – backed with a gun. And the hierarchy that owns you is just another
Mafia. In fact the Mafia doesn’t stoop to pretending that it has any kind of
legitimacy – it just does its coercive thing. You could take a lesson from them
– it might make you more honest.”

The
Support System“Before moving on
to discuss the political class, I want to address your coworkers, James – all
the people employed in this great courthouse building – in fact all the people
working in the whole grand hierarchy we lovingly call our government –To all of
you I want say, some of you are slaves
and some of you are masters. Government is an environment where the slave and
political classes mingle at the bottom of the political class – and the
political class and the ownership class mingle at the top of the political
class. As one progresses up the pyramid, the preponderance of psychopaths in
the environment increases markedly – but if you were to observe their social
events, you’d see they keep plenty of wage-slaves around to take care of their
varied needs and desires.

“As
I am still addressing the slaves, throughout the system, I want you to
understand that you are a big part of the problem that our species faces today.
Your salaries are paid with money stolen from you by extortion – and from your brethren everywhere. Don’t you
think you could have made better use of the money had it not been stolen from
you?”

“Don’t
you think you have a right to a choice in the matter? Well, you do have a
choice. You can work in the private sector as an individual entrepreneur.”

“I
know. Entrepreneurship is risky. You might fail at it. Slaves fear failure more
than anything – that’s part of needing approval. I suggest you get over it.
There are people who can provide the help you need. Having the right kind of
help makes the task much easier and quicker. When you get over your fear of
failing, you’ll be free.”

“One
final comment to this group: Not only are your salaries stolen from more
creative people, but your participation in that hierarchy constitutes support for the malignant system that
you serve. If not stopped, and stopped soon, that system will inaugurate the
darkest period of oppression in human history. And you will have been one of those responsible.
Get out now, while you still can.”

“The
Compulsion to “Control” Others…is seen in both the
political class and the ownership class – always the sure indicator of a psychopathic nature. No one knows exactly what
causes psychopathy – but its characteristics are well known. There are
indications that it is a common condition among men whose genetic makeup
includes an extra chromosome. It is also well known that certain forms of early
abuse (both physical and mental) contribute to the formation of psychopathy.
For this reason, many knowledgeable practitioners consider it to be a characterstructure…and
a particularly rigid one, at that. Having been severely dominated as a child, the psychopath becomes a dominator – or, as
some would say, a ‘control freak’.”

“The extreme
psychopath (yes, there are different degrees of psychopathy), is completely cut
off from his feelings (assuming he actually has some, to begin with). He experiences
no empathy, no conscience, and no remorse. He (or she) sees others as fair game
for any kind of fraud, thievery, sadism, assault, torture, mayhem, murder or
genocide that the psychopath wishes to impose upon his victims. His
conversations are mostly comprised of lies – some credible and some outrageous
– about which he has no compunctions whatever. Nor has he any about anything
else.”

“For some reason,
probably cultural bias, female psychopaths comprise less than 10% of the
psychopath population. But we can certainly see a sampling of them as we listen
to the speeches of some of the more politically prominent ones today.”

So to all you
psychopaths I say: “We know you. You can’t hide in sheep’s clothing any more.
We see you. And when your time comes, since we can’t cure your condition, we know we have to constrain you. The most
just way to do this would be to exile you – to a region where you could live
among your own kind. It remains to be seen whether we’ll have the resources to
do that when the time comes. Maybe someday…”

“With the advent of the BitCoin and its copy-cats we now have an
anonymous medium of exchange that can’t be regulated, devalued, confiscated, or
otherwise manipulated. This means we now have a free market at last. The
cartels of the world won’t like this. By breaking their monopoly stranglehold
on money, we can break free of them entirely. Cartels are a curse on humanity.
Every human activity that is registered, regulated, licensed, forbidden, or otherwise
controlled is dominated by a cartel.”

“Get
a Clue, James…The world is
changing. A new era is dawning – and we don’t know for sure whether it will be
a bright new day with lots of new opportunities – or the beginning of an
extended period of darkness. At this point it could go either way. The giant
parasite that I call the BORG (Banks, Organized Religions, and Governments) might raze the earth with a nuclear
holocaust – ultimately covering the earth with ice and destroying its host (the
rest of us), or it might commit suicide by deploying a bunch of biological
weapons, of which it undoubtedly has a secret stockpile – to which it thinks it
is immune.”

“Alternatively, the
noble (ownership) ruling class might go into hiding in giant underground cities
(bunkers) and luxury accommodations overseas. At the moment there seem to be
preparations underway along both avenues.”

“Jimmy, I’m not here to tell you how all
of this is going to end…but rather I’m giving you a ‘heads up’ that a change is beginning. I’m free, Jimmy –
and you can be too, should you make that choice. Heed my words before it is too
late. Shed your fear and let me show you the path, then you can decide whether
to walk it.